Topic: Any large mining farms in the U.S. using real-time or day ahead power pricing? (Read 122 times)

Update:

I realized it would be a bad idea to buy very old ASICs, because not only will they break, but because the cost of building that capacity is too high. It makes no sense to buy an Antminer S9 for $280 if the buildout cost (electric + ventilation) is $200/kW. The newest gen is also a bad idea, because it's harder to insure and I risk more capital per terahash.

The T17 or S17 seem to be better choices. They have reasonable efficiency while I can still take advantage of changes in the energy index.

I wrote code to analyze ERCOT rates for the past 30 days. For the T17, the all-in rate would be 6.72¢ with 100% uptime, or 6.08¢ with 95% uptime. That comes out to 3-6% more profit on average by powering down during peak prices.

Once I can get rid of the pesky sales tax and buy transformers instead of using ONCOR's secondary service, the rates would be 5.7¢ for 100% uptime, or 5.13¢ for 95% uptime.

Of course, these rates would be 1-1.5¢ higher during the summer. There is no way to avoid that.

Update:

I talked to an energy provider. They told me that it's possible to get real-time marginal energy prices in Texas on ERCOT if the load is at least 50 kW. That requires only 15 Antminer S19 units or 50 Antminer L3+ units or 300-350 RTX 3060 video cards.

I'll be opening up my mini warehouse in May/June with an index power contract. Looks like the total power cost (energy + dist. + premium) + tax will be 7.8¢ for 100% uptime, or 7.1¢ for 95% uptime (where the machines are powered down during peak load hours).

It is possible to buy older ASICs like the Avalon 821 and run them profitably overnight, when the rate is just 4.0¢. Uptime would be 60%. If the payback period on them is < 300 days, it might be worthwhile.

Hello, I'm wondering if there are any commercial ASIC mining farm operators located in the U.S., especially Texas, who have negotiated real time (hourly) or day ahead pricing with their utility. I'd also like to know if any farms have old ASICs like the Antminer S9 or Avalon 1146 that are usually unprofitable.

I'm thinking of writing software that takes in real time or next-day grid prices (preferrably ERCOT) and can remotely turn less efficient ASIC miners on/off depending on what the power cost is. I'm hoping that these old miners can be profitable if they run overnight, or when power is cheap enough.

I have done some preliminary calculations. For a medium-sized farm using at least 100 kW, it looks like you can get a 200-day ROI on a used $350 Antminer S9 as long as power costs < 4¢/kWh (uptime = 60-70%). Basically, it would be turned off during the afternoon and evening or during heat waves in the summer. This accounts for the higher demand charge for having a 60-70% load factor instead of running 24/7 and getting 99%. The demand charge averages 2¢ and the energy charge averages 2¢ during that 60-70% period of runtime.

You would probably have to plug in a small Raspberry Pi to the same LAN as the miners, and my backend would broadcast commands to perform the switching. Yes, the miners are less efficient, but heat is less of a concern because the weather tends to be cooler when electric prices are lower.

Would anybody with these older ASICs be interested in such a service instead of recycling them? If not, I'm thinking of starting my own warehouse with a few dozen used 16nm ASICs and seeing how it goes. 200 days seems really good for SHA-256 mining, and with ETH going to PoS, this might be a good investment.